[GiNaC-list] GiNaC is not a package manager (Was: some flexibility problems with configure)

[Sheplyakov Alexei]

Hello!

On Sun, Aug 06, 2006 at 04:20:11PM -0700, Richard Haney wrote:
 
> It seems to me that an extremely good idea is to make a general
> practice of keeping separate software packages in separate file
> hierarchies,
This is in fact very bad idea...

> especially when one is installing packages tentatively and
> may want to delete or uninstall such packages later. 
.. but nothing prevents you from using --prefix=/whatever/you/want.

> In other words, it seems an extremely good idea to keep packages as 
> mutually independent as possible, and when dependence is necessary,
> to make it very clear (by adding strategically named annotation files,
> for example) what that dependence is.
These dependences are specified in debian/* (and GiNaC.spec.in).

> and moreover it seems to be more  complication for the user than
> should be necessary.
You made this complication yourself (by choosing weird installation
paths).

> It seems one possibility would be a command such as
> ./configure CLN="C:/gnu/cln-1.1.11/gcc342"
> READLINE="C:/gnu/readline-5.1/gcc342"
> TERMCAP="C:/gnu/termcap-1.3.1/gcc342"

GiNaC configure script provides --with-cln-prefix option
 
> Another improvement that seems a good idea is in general to place a
> single value -- such as, for example, the configure script's option
> value of "--prefix" -- in one standard location that all Makefiles
> would refer to,

You might want to read autoconf manual, specifically the chapter about
CONFIG_SITE variable.

> I would like to hear what others think of the general idea and various
> practices in managing software packages to be as mutually independent
> as possible, except where dependence is really needed.
Long time ago package managers was written to solve these problems. If 
your OS lacks such a package manager, GiNaC is not going to provide one.

 think porting dpkg/APT to win32 would be better approach.
 
> As experience shows, it seems to me that the build process needs to be
> designed to allow for the possibilities that bugs will appear and that
> a relatively build-unspecialized user needs to respond to those bugs in
> a flexible manner.

May be this user should read 

http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/bugs.html

first?
 
Best regards,
 Alexei.

-- 
All science is either physics or stamp collecting.

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